B Lab

Have you ever heard the term B Corporation? It’s “a new type of corporation which uses the power of business to solve social and environmental problems.” If you’ve been following One Day, One Job for a while or you’ve been reading through our archives, you already know of quite a few B Corporations—Better World Books, New Leaf Paper, Seventh Generation, and King Arthur Flour are a few that we’ve already featured. Each of these companies has met “comprehensive and transparent social and environmental standards via the B Rating System” and then officially amended “their corporate governing documents to incorporate stakeholder interests.” They’ve all done this through B Lab (or B Corporation, there’s still some ambiguity in their name), a Berwyn, PA based non-profit organization that is behind the B Corporation movement.

B a Part of Something Big

B Corporations have a double/triple/multiple bottom line. They’re not just in business to make a profit, although profit motives are still an important part of what they do. The certification of B Corporations comes from B Lab. Considering how many successful companies have already jumped on board (190 B Corporations with $1 billion in combined revenue across 31 industries), this movement seems like it has a lot of momentum. I’m looking forward to finding more exciting B Corporations to feature here in the future, but for the moment let’s stay focused and talk about jobs at B Lab. There’s no reason for me to think that they’re currently hiring (they don’t even have a jobs page), but they do seem to be growing. Their Idealist profile includes a number of internship postings, and their Staff page shows what kind of jobs they do offer. If you want to be a part of B Lab, you’re going to have to take the initiative and apply for an unlisted position, but that’s just how it should be with a relatively small non-profit startup.